Is someone having a laugh? Why is there a George Galloway Close in Coventry?

I was invited for a trip aboard an 80-year-old schooner called the Shearwater last night. Lots of fun. And the chance to meet some New York bloggers, including Danny Schechter of News Dissector, Alex of travel blog Jaunted, and my old pal Nosher of NYCnosh (or was it HungryMan? I always get confused).

Unfortunately there was no wind at all last night, so there was no chance to raise the sails. Instead, we drifted with the current along the west side of Manhattan and then headed out for a quick peek at the Statue of Liberty, which I’d never seen at night before.

Thanks to Jasmine of Glamourite for arranging. And to Tom for being such a gracious host.

I am close to the Muslim community in Britain 2 million strong. And there is undoubtedly a huge radicalization going on amongst British Muslims including in my own area. We try to be the democratic antidote to those siren voices in the Muslim community preaching isolationism, separatism, extremism and violence.

Galloway, Dubai Eye radio program, August, 20, 2006.

The invasion of Lebanon by Israel, for that’s what it is, is a monstrous injustice.

I side with the resistance to that injustice. Hizbollah is leading that resistance. I do not hesitate to say, and Blair and his law officers may take note, that I glorify that resistance.

I glorify the Hizbollah national resistance movement, and I glorify the leader of Hizbollah, Sheikh Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.

George Galloway, Socialist Worker Online, July 29, 2005.

They can control the skies, but only if they don’t come within range of an RPG, but they can’t control one single street in any part of occupied Iraq. Not one street. Not one street anywhere. These poor Iraqis – ragged people, with their sandals, with their Kalashnikovs, with the lightest and most basic of weapons – are writing the names of their cities and towns in the stars, with 145 military operations every day, which has made the country ungovernable by the people who occupy it.

George Galloway, Al-Jazeera TV, July 31, 2005

Like many if not most UK journalists (and I suspect most US journalists) I never learned to touch type. I can type quickly, somewhere in the region of 50 to 60 WPM, but my technique—if it can be classed as such—consists of six fingers crashing down on different and highly arbitrary areas of the keyboard.

I’ve suffered with occasional twinges in my arms and wrists for the past couple of years, particularly during times when I am conducting and transcribing lengthy interviews. It all came to a head last month when I had to stop typing because the pain was so intense.

I bought ergonomic keyboard and mouse pad supports. I invested in a fetching black Lycra wrist support glove. Finally I ended up in a rheumatologist’s office where I was prescribed steroids and told to improve my posture at the keyboard. I bought a gas lift chair.

But I also decided to improve my typing technique.

On the advice of a friend I downloaded a free trial of a touch typing tutor called Ten Thumbs. The program teaches you the keyboard and improves your accuracy and speed through a series of lessons and games.

I started exactly two weeks ago today. The free trial ended after I learned one-third of the keyboard and I upgraded to the full version for $25.95. Practicing for between a half hour and an hour a day, I have learned all the letters, the numbers and the nearby symbols. My speed is up to 30 WPM and my accuracy is about 95%.

I’m not quite fast enough or accurate enough for ‘real’ writing (my brain won’t accept the delay between thought and screen). But I am quick enough for emails. And for this blog post. Hopefully within a couple of weeks, I’ll never need to look down again.

If you’ve ever wondered about touch typing but thought it was too late to learn, perhaps it would be worth giving it a go. Try Ten Thumbs.

I wonder if Galloway’s record-breaking broadcast from among his latest constituents in Beirut will include this news from Michael Totten:

Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Seniora is now talking about a peace treaty with Israel…This is huge, really, even if it’s only talk and even if Hezbollah can unilaterally jam up the deal by shooting more rockets. No Lebanese politician would have dared to say such a thing two months ago with a Syrian gun pointed at the right side of his head, a Hezbollah gun pointed at the left side, and the reactionary mentality that prevails in certain Lebanese quarters.